History Repeats Digitally

Subscribing to Geo-Feeds and Location-based services through Perceptive Networks

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 20:00:00 +0000

The concept of using RSS feeds to keep up-to-date on any topic is certainly nothing new. However, the idea of Geo-feeds and location-based is one that is yet to be fully explored. And I’m not referring to subscribing to news content or social media updates based on current events in your city or what your local friends have posted on facebook. Rather, what if I subscribed to a feed that provides me with information that is being uploaded and posted in my neighborhood? Are there photos within a 5 mile radius uploaded to the Flickr for me to see? Has someone recently posted a review of a restaurant just down the block, or if reviews were posted regarding a movie currently playing at your local movie theatre? Or what if tweets were posted about an event happening within your community? What if you were in the market for a home in a specific area and a seller just posted property?

One may ask what the utility of subscribing to such Geo-Feeds and/or Location-based services, but stopping to think about the possibility for such services provides markets with new opportunities in this space, and is clearly an indicator of mobile innovation.

Again, mobile versions of Yelp and Facebook are available for one to log in and check updates either directly or their email, and twitter is certainly one step closer to bring you updates of friends via text tweets, but I feel that the real future of connective services is through that of a Perceptive Network, one that provides individuals with relative updates based on where they are and what they are doing at any given time.

If your geo-feed is enabled to receive automated parameters (such as your location via GPS on your phone, your login information for Facebook, YouTube, Flickr and Twitter all through one global openID), it could then send you immediate updates that apply to where you are, and based your preferences.

So the next time you are in downtown SF and your friends are strolling down Union Square, taking photos at the Westfield, shopping on Market Street, or meeting up with someone you know at the BART station on Powell, your perceptive network will know as the result of searching your own personal networks online for information relating to your local area.

For additional thinking fodder, check out Faris’ articles on The Invisible Web, as well as Hanna Beyenbach’s article on Location-based services. Both of these intentionally are just scratching the surface on this topic.

Happy future gazing :)

Discovery is Becoming Social

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 23:01:00 +0000

In viewing a talk by Jyri Engestrom on social objects, social peripheral vision and nodal points, I thought his insights on social networks from these unique perspectives were quite interesting.

Right around 29:23 of the video, he states that traditional search engine queries and site visitation will ultimately be replaced by gaining more relevant information through status updates, posts, and link sharing within social networks and IM. This notion of “social filtering” applied to how we consume and value information shows how making the entire Web social is not only about people connecting directly through each other, but through content acting as a social object.

Watch the video on the Reboot website.

Slide presentation below:

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: vision peripheral)

Presentation: Extending the Digital Experience

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 20:37:00 +0000

I know I haven't posted in a while, as things have been a bit busy over the last several weeks. However, I thought i'd make up for it by posting my newest presentation, also available on Slideshare.

Similar to my previous digital media presentation , the deck focuses on some of the new interactions which are occuring between brands and users as the result of our changing behavior both on and off the Web.

Interactions: Extending The Digital Experience

View more presentations or upload your own. (tags: experience utility)

Who's Connected and How

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Sun, 23 Jan 2011 19:34:00 +0000

A visual depecting how connectivity among the global population:

Based on the CIA World Factbook, Greenland is the most connected population in terms of internet access (with over 90% of the total population connected). More interestingly, The United Arab Emirates has an average of 1.6 cell phone per citizens.

Via Good Magazine

Future Social: Nine Trends Shaping the Future of Social Interactions

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Sun, 23 Jan 2011 01:32:00 +0000

Recently, during the LIFT Asia Conference, Nokia researcher and anthropoligist Jan Chipchase provided insight into some of the following trends that are shaping social interactions throughout the globe:

The first is that social interactions are becoming pocketable, making it possible to carry the tools one uses to communicate, entertain, and help you understand where you are and what you want to do next
The rise of serial solitary experiences – a concept of being together with others in the same place doing the same thing, but on different devices through a shared, but filtered experience
The increase in connectivity among people, services, and the locations around us through those objects which we carry. While this in itself is somewhat a new concept, our decision to share our location (as well as how), and other geo-contextual information, with whom, and with what level of granularity is shaping the mobile space
The question of opting out of a technology becoming one of whether to opt out of society is becoming a reality, as sharing creates significant social pressure to adopt new technology
Such connectivity, along with the increasing sophistication of online services is allowing us to reduce the time between asking a question and receiving an answer through real-time associations
The adoption of such technology at a younger age (which is more evident in the mainstream), to the point where technological and social literacy will become niche to older generations who can’t keep up
The boundaries between personal and work life will continue to erode as the result of convenience (i.e. checking email on the way to work)
The speed of technological change will continue to increase and that for some services, their lifetime will be measure in days or hours
That pocketable is just a stepping stone to such technology becoming invisible, not in the sense of a seamless experience, but simply that such innovations will be so small and hidden that no one else can see.

Watch the video on the LIFT Asia Conference website.

More on Perceptive Networks

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 21:01:00 +0000

Just to further expand upon the notion of a perceptive network (see previous post), the reality of this type of service could be close than your think. With current exploration in location-based services, this realm can be explored further from asocial standpoint. I think providing another example would help to clarifying the role of such perceptive networks.

Say you head out downtown for the weekend for the usual hanging out, shopping, dining, etc. You login to your perceptive network, which would then determine where you are by a GPS-enabled device. An hour later, the networks detects that your friend posted a tweet indicating he was at the bookstore perusing the arts section.

If you were nearby, the network would then send you a text alerting you of your friends proximity, where you could then reply to his tweet, or call him directly. Later that night, two of your friends who you had no idea were going to attend a show you have tickets for, updated their Facebook profile to talk about the band they were excited to see, of which gets picked up by your perceptive network and shared with you.

End the night with an update of where any of your friends might be out that night, and you have opportunities to connect with whomever your choose, moving from one encounter to the other, and navigating the city based on your social connections. This social-driven mobility is at the heart of perceptive networks, of which purpose is to provide users with sharing their experiences with those they know.

Imagine then the possibility of today’s social networks opening their back doors to more and more developers, such as Facebook Connect, and allows ways for marketers to reach users at the geo-local level and understand where they are and what they do to provide consumers with relevant tools and updates.

Taking all of this to a third degree, technologies such as TikiTag and Mir:ror also make sense in interacting with your perceptive network. If it’s late a night, and the group is out for a night on the town and now heading home, there’s always that slight chance that one’s wallet or key’s end up missing. So if Johnny left his keys at the bar, but hopefully his wallet is still in his back pocket (if not, I’m wondering how much the chap had to drink), your perceptive network would notice that one of the two objects that should be with you (or rather close to each other), has gone missing, and would notify you via text before you even noticed, which could be by the time you are at your front door.

Perceptive networks, then, are just that – networks created through objects tagged with RFIDs, online networks, mobile devices and SPIMES providing geotility, and other personal digital information, which perceive where you, your friends, and important objects are at any point in time, and what they are doing/located in relation to other objects.

Bear in mind, that those who are part of your social network who also have their own perceptual network will make it easier for your own network to know where they are, so long as you and that person have opted to connect each other’s network (but interactions among different perceptive networks is another story to be continued…)

Not Just Digital Natives and Immigrants, but Naturalized Digital Citizens

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 21:17:00 +0000

Most of today’s online usage comes from countries that have been online for over almost a decade, if not more. That is where today’s digital immigrants (those adopting web usage during life) and digital natives (those who have grown up with the Web, mobile technology, and various forms of convergence media) are accessing the Internet. But what about less developed countries where the online population is less abundant, only because the opportunity to access the Internet by home, work, or public access point is not available? With programs such as One Laptop Per Child, and AMD’s 50x15 initiative, with its goal of connecting 50% of the world’s population by 2015, the result will be a new kind of connected user, who will become a naturalized digital citizen.

Technology adoption is growing in these Leap-frogging nations at a much faster pace. And with other countries embracing mobile, which is now growing at 8x that of the Web, soon, everyone around the world will participate in the digital world.

Welcome To The 4th Screen

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Mon, 17 Jan 2011 19:54:00 +0000

Not a new clip by all means, but definitely worth posting. Nokia does a great job of emphasizing what has come about since the beginning of public gatherings to enjoy film, to TV and the Internet, and finally the 4th screen.

Collective Streaming and Connected Socialization Through Proximity

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Sat, 08 Jan 2011 20:01:00 +0000

Previously, I posted on the idea of interactions among perceptive networks. The example referred to services such as Twones and Tony Player which have combined to provide dance club audiences with the creation of playlists in real-time. I also alluded to the concept of the creation of a group perceptive network, allowing audiences to interact with each other as the result of sharing, in this case, their taste in music.

These types of interactions that are beginning to emerge as the result of innovation has brought about new behaviors, which are enhanced through digital media. The first, is something I refer to as Collective Streaming.

Collective streaming occurs when participants provide personal data to create something completely new in real-time, which then becomes public for others to see. Examples of this include over-referenced Nike+ or the more recent Human Race, also by Nike. In the case of Twones, users rely on the service to display their usernames and photos next to the song being shown on-screen. What then results is recognition, which people usually admire :)

Remembering that the example is the result of a social, local, and physical experience, what also occurs simultaneously is a second behavior similar to the first, know as Collective Personalization. This notion of a collective and personalized experience comes only from the participation of others, and one that would otherwise not be the same were it not for the contribution of the crowd.

Equally interesting is a third behavior, which I refer to as Connected Socialization Through Proximity. Because of location-based services that alert the resident DJ that a Twones member has arrived, soon, that user will have the opportunity to engage with others through the service, which then provides a new social context as the result of people being in the same location, but interacting through the on-screen system in a live environment, or even perhaps on a more personal level through mobile devices and newly created social networks.

The glue for all this of course is a perceptive network that can connect people and allow them to communicate with others and the physical objects they own, regardless of what services they are using. And while the concept of a perceptive network may seem a bit vague or theoretical at best, I’d argue that now that we have begun to talk about the Internet of Things being made of innovations such as RFID technology and augmented reality, then Perceptual networks will come about from the adoption of OpenID, OAuth, and location-based services.

Interactions Among Different Perceptive Networks

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 21:25:00 +0000

One example of how perceptive networks might interact with one another is by taking a concept that already exists. Through Tony Player’s partnership with Twones, users who subscribe to this service can share a music timeline of songs they’ve listened to by arriving to a club using the Tony Player system (this is already happening in Belgium) and alerting Twones via text message. Twones then captures a users music stream data, providing it to the DJ who re-mixes and creates a new playlist for the crowd.

The result is a creation of a group perceptive network that is created in real-time when individual users allow their perceptive network to interact with other perceptive networks through web and location-based systems. In this example, the single collective stream of music is used to join perceptive networks to each other. Users can then view other user’s music, profile, photos, and other information should they allow each other to do so via request to link their perspective network.

Just another interesting way of how Perceptive Networks will emerge through entertainment platforms as the result of active participation and other types of similar opportunities.

The Power of People

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Wed, 27 May 2009 03:02:00 +0000

My friend Joakim from Norway put together a nifty slideshare presentation called The Power of People and was so kind as to quote me in it :o

Power Of People

View more Microsoft Word documents from Joakim vars Nilsen.

The Newest Meme of Digital: Design Strategy

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Wed, 27 May 2009 02:58:00 +0000

There's currently a new meme circulating the web around the concept of "Design Strategy." This film comes from a design agency called Continuum.

Doing what we love, anywhere we want

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Sun, 17 May 2009 02:14:00 +0000

I just heard a new catchy song, "Daylight" by Matt and Kim which aired on the new Bacardi commercial. The video itself is interesting, as it depicts the duo playing music where one usually wouldn't expect.

This got me to think that doing what we love, anywhere we want to, is a concept that is being embraced by those building great services and applications. Being able to do what we love and then having the ability to share that with others is what creates great digital services, applications, design, and experiences.

We as social creatures are self-aggregating ourselves

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 19:22:00 +0000

That which allows us to become more social online - mobile, software, web services and communities - is also allowing us to self-aggregate in ways that define us based on our affinities and abilities. It has to do less about the technology itself and more about the connections we make.

The experiences we create as a result of those connections are just as important as the experiences that brands are trying to create for us. It wouldn't hurt marketers once in a while to embrace our own self-created experiences and do all that they can to facilitate certain aspects of our user-created conversation and participation given their resources.

flickr photo by notsogoodphotograhy

To brands serving up lemons: "We aren't interested in lemonade."

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 03:26:00 +0000

Especially in this economy, everyone with a product or service offering is doing all they can to grab out attention, with less means of doing so. However, at this point where life is throwing many of us lemons, I ask, should we get used to drinking lemonade, or are we thirsting for something that's actually desirable?

Every so often though, something good pop us to treat us during hard times, whether it's entertaining, useful, thoughtful, funny, or just plain weird, so long as it's not boring or annoying.

Don't get me wrong. Sometimes we ourselves as consumers, users, evaluators, and participants can be sour. Take the example of Facebook's new redesign, which groups of over 2.6 million have now gathered on the social network to talk about how much of a lemon the site's look and feel has become.

How about some good examples? Dunkin Donuts has certainly caught my attention, beating out Starbucks since the beginning of the year by serving up coffee that many of us can now afford (or at least not feel bad about spending on). The company's DunkinBeatStarbucks.com site provides a laugh or two which we could all use right now, and we can certainly appreciate someone giving us a positive nudge by saying "You Kin Do It."

What did Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz have to say about all this? His response was merely "Are you going to say to your friend, 'Lets go meet at Dunkin' Donuts'? Are you going to say that?"

C'mon, really? Since when did the green apron-wearing people start serving up a grande cup of bitter lemonade? It now appears to be on the menu...

Flickr photo by accipitereye

Not one, nor many conversations, but many communities

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 05:24:00 +0000

To marketers and their brands: He who creates conversations within the most communities wins. This is certainly true of audiences who now exist across multiple areas of the web.

While many of us always seem to say that its not just enough to join or participate with users on the web as brands, it really isn't enough to create one, or many conversations, but to do so within many communities.

Nike is a prime example of how it does this well. In the U.S., while Nike's display ad spending is alot smaller compared to other premier brands, the shoe company certainly spends time providing content to niche communities and create conversation around sub brands such as Jordan, 6.0, and NikeID. Whether its leaking the location of where the next pair of limited edition Dunks are going to drop, or releasing a bootleg of the Nike Skate video, the brand understands that this content will create buzz that will ring from one community to the next, until it reaches the mainstream and other conversational channels such as Twitter, which is becoming the echo chamber of choice.

Helge Tenno and Mark Earls are some really smart folk who've said similar things with regards to igniting conversation and starting lots of small fires on the web.

Flick photo by wonderlane.

What is media, and is it all created equal?

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 03:19:00 +0000

Great article by Jean Pascal Mathieu in OMMA Magazine. I'll briefly steal/paraphrase here...

What do we consider to be media, and how do we as individuals define it?

Media is generally defined as "tools that store and deliver information or data." However this can still mean different things depending on who you are and what you are talking about.

For instance, to marketers, media is vehicles for places to run ads that will by target audiences.

For the general public, media is usually seen as major brands and broadcast channels providing news and entertainment over the air or within print.

For those surfing the Web, media can mean online and other digital destinations that deliver information, entertainment or opinions produced by their peers.

What's more, the emergence of blogs, social media networks and mico-blogging communities have pretty much blurred the lines of distinction between these definitions, which again begs the question: Are all media really equal?

Nurun's VP of Strategy Jean Pascal Mathieu outlined the following factors that help shape our perceptions of what "real" media are:

A clear editorial mission, usually aimed at a particular niche audience or political position.
The ability to produce original content sufficient to keep the property alive and interesting to the audience.
Responsibility for the quality and value of the content delivered, as well as adherence to a professional code of ethics.
The ability to ensure a level of distribution and visibility congruent with what the public expects of media: presence on newsstands, on the street, in a cable package, on the air, or in a Web news aggregator.
Regular or continuous delivery of "hot" information, as defined by the distribution channel and the media type.

His underlying premise is that a media property that exhibits most or all of these features will have a strong identity. I also agree with what he states regarding how social media has made is possible for orginary people to publish their opinions in what he calls the middle ages of media.

"But what is interesting now, in these "middle ages" of media, is the mix; on the nytimes.com, bloggers and readers opine alongside journalists, although each plays a different role. A lot of the content that finds its way onto the Web property would never have been considered "Fit to Print" by America's traditional newspaper of record. The result is a media hybrid, perhaps, but it's a rich and more relevant media mix."

All really good points to think about as the web brings our change in media consumption and behavior.

The Magical Land of Twitter

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 02:56:00 +0000

For all those Twitter addicts who are "twuoting" all over the place...

The Great Discriminator

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 05:42:00 +0000

I've recently picked up John Zogby's The Way We'll Be again, after a long pause due to some arduous work over the last couple of weeks. Nevertheless, I'm impressed by that extensive knowlege that Zogby has as a pollster, especially when it comes to identify trends among the
connect class and their digital behaviors.

In talking about millennials and how they are global, networked and inclusive of just anything, Zogby described how the Internet plays a part in the lives of this group of digital immigrants and natives, which he defines as the First Globals:

While i've never really thought of travel in the sense of the manifestation of the exploration or "travel" that happens on the Web, it makes sense. Many of the tweets and status updates I view on a daily basis regarding my social circles are directly linked to travel. Whether it's "on vacation," or "attending a conference," travel seems to be a growing topic that many of us choose to share with others. Even if I can't find myself going away for a couple of days, or able to attend a conference or industry panel discussion, I often find myself watching such events virtually through video and presentations (lagged of course after they've ended).

Where will you travel today, either online or in the physical world? When will there no longer be a difference?

Great presos on Context, Convergence, Participation, Accessibility, and Digital Abilities

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 04:21:00 +0000

I wanted to make sure and spread this around. Helge does an amazing job at stating things so eloquently with regards to pretty much anything digital. If you haven't followed his blog, or viewed any of his slideshows, i suggest starting with two of the most recent below.

Kids and Teens Abandoning Social Networking Profiles for Blogs and Video?

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 19:04:00 +0000

Certantly nothing too new about the greying social networks and community websites, but it is interesting to see the numbers behind it.

What fascinates me more is that the number of users on community and social networks has decreased among the 2-17 age group according to new Nielsen data. Even as this group is mostl likely making up the majority of users on communities like Bebo, AOL Red, SocialVide, Habbo, or even within gaming areas such as MapleStory, I ask myself: if those 9% are really no longer interested in community websites, where then are they going?

According to comScore, traffic to YouTube rose 37% from Feb ‘08 to Feb 2009, compared to 27% for the U.S. total audience. Usage of blog platforms such as Blogger increased 42% over the same time period, which is significantly higher than 16% of the total U.S. population online.

Are teens abandoning their social profiles and updates and focusing on blogs and video more, or have they always? At the end of the day, people are still hungry for interesting content, wherever that may be.

Don't Just Talk to, Talk WIth

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 04:28:00 +0000

Something that's been on my mind has been participation within community, specifically bloggers. While I do enjoy sharing my thoughts with those i've come to know, I'm always hopeful that I can grow new friendships with those visiting this space. And while I wish there were more comments (either positive or negative), I realize that I myself should comment more.

Why do we choose to comment? And why do we most certainly comment in our minds as we read content, but almost never do? It takes time to reply and post your opinion around a topic, which of course takes more commitment to do than simply visiting a blog or an RSS aggregator.

But I'm convinced that commenting is a habit that is to be formed, just as any other habit, even blogging. Most of my comments end up on Twitter or Facebook, which make the commenting process easier. I can comment by actually writing something, I can vote or "like" content and/or other comments. I can share (which is really a form of commenting that says "this is good and worth sharing), and even commenting on status updates just seems like fun if anything else.

So I'm challenging myself to comment more around the content I see and read, and hope to share that experience. If you're reading this because I commented on your blog and somehow ended here, great. :o

Because, at the end of the day, is commenting just as fulfilling as posting content? I'll let you know :o

Care to take the challenge with me and create conversation? Tweet me a holla.

10 Ways to Spread Stuff: New Distribution Strategies for 2009

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 04:07:00 +0000

How digital touch points have evolved over the last couple of years has brought about new meaning to what Web 2.0 really means. Specifically, the explosive growth of social content, and broadcasting both branded and user-generated stuff has pushed us all to coming up with new ways of distributing that very same content.

As a result, I've been pondering and thinking about new forms of distribution and areas for engagement across the web, as a part of extending the digital experience by looking at the entire web as an engagement platform, not just the pretty social media, videos, and updates on Twitter.

The following are 10 ways to spread "stuff" - content, ideas, and anything else you can link to:

Content sharing and creation, which also includes the co-creation of content (all hail the mashup and remix culture).
Community engagement through blogging, joining groups, and collaboration
Social expression through badging
Knowledge sharing, How-tubing, and other tutorial, expertise, and wiki-type things
Sharing your opinion as a stranger about anything - Rating, voting, writing reviews, customer feedback, and posting responses through comments
Deliberate propagation of an idea, through word-of-mouth, promotion, blogging, link sharing, starting conversations, and other forms of digital kudos
The ever-popular status update. Everyone feels like broadcasting what they are doing and where they are doing because we can, so we just do.
If you haven't noticed, social = mobile (slide 22, and slide 23) and vice versa. Mobile is becoming a social enabler specifically providing ways to map and share our mobility. Think location-based services wrapped in a social burrito (i couldn't think of anything else to say outside of "enigma").
The word viral has been so misused and abused, it pretty much doesn't mean much nowadays because we're trying to call everything viral. Rather, the new content journey is all about social discovery (slide 13), and knowing about something because someone you know shared something they thought was cool. When is the last time you visited a micro-site to get something you kept hearing about?
Finally, making content and ideas slippy rather than sticky has proved that good ideas can survive and travel across the sea of blogs, social networking sites, communities, inboxes, and even mainstream news sites. If it's not stealable, er, embeddable/shareable/portable, it will never get anywhere for obvious reasons.

And thats it. It's really what I have been saying all along, as well as all the amazing digital minds out there. Feel free to tweet about it with me.

Future Virtual Worlds

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 06:08:00 +0000

An inspiring short film depicting a world of holographics and building worlds. Truly amazing.

Blog Authors and Content Collaboration

noreply@blogger.com (David) — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 05:05:00 +0000

One of the bloggers which I follow and am most fascinated by is Bud Caddell's What Consumes Me, not only because of Bud's thinking or for kindly sharing it, but mostly because of his ability to take the blog medium and use it as a platform for collaboration. Take a visit to his blog and you'll see exactly what it mean.

"I want to write for your blog. Gratis. But you have to give me a great question or profound thought to ponder."

This is how Bud starts off posts written for other fellow bloggers, then asking his visitors to visit the blog to read the guest article in its entirety.

As a hats off to Bud for fostering collaboration among the personal blogging crowd, I'd like to take the idea up as one to follow. I've enjoyed commenting with several of you, emailing and reaching out to others, and have had the pleasure of posting content on History Repeats Digitally as well as on Slideshare where I have also met some great people.

I'd like to reach out to some of you personally over the next couple of weeks to ask if you are interested in contributing to this blog on a per-post basis, with the intention of fostering collaboration, and stating that I'd be happy to do the same on your blog if the occasion arises.

Thanks to all for continuing to read and share your thoughts.